Ben Rhodes: “Will be more effective combating ideology” of Islamic State “if we don’t describe them as religious org”

This is so counterfactual that it boggles the mind — and it’s official U.S. government policy. Ben Rhodes is actually saying that we will be more effective in combating the Islamic State’s ideology if we pretend that it is other than what it is. Meanwhile, the Islamic State continues to win recruits among Muslims around the world by appealing to them on the basis of Islamic texts and teachings. Rhodes waves that away as a “perversion of Islam,” and the administration does absolutely nothing to counter it.

Rhodes says that “if this is defined as a conflict that is inherently about religion that leads to policies like not allowing Muslims to enter the United States or policies of more excessive surveillance and denial of civil liberties to Muslim-Americans.” No American citizens should be deprived of their Constitutional rights. But Rhodes if this really is a conflict about religion, then we have to take legal and Constitutional steps to deal with that. What Obama and Rhodes are doing instead is deciding a priori that it is not a conflict about religion, and then refusing to consider lawful steps that might be necessary to counter this threat because they’re politically incorrect or too politically costly.

“Rhodes: ISIS Fight ‘Will Be More Effective’ Not Calling Them ‘Religious Organization,'” by Bridget Johnson, PJ Media, June 15, 2016:

Deputy National Security Advisor Ben Rhodes told PBS that President Obama doesn’t use the term “radical Islam” because “we will be more effective in combating that ideology” of ISIS “if we don’t describe them as a religious organization.”

Rhodes said the concern after the Orlando nightclub attack, in which shooter Omar Mateen pledged allegiance to ISIS, is “how are we going to pursue a strategy that both defeats ISIL overseas, but also tries to combat an ideology that could prey upon a deeply disturbed individual like this, and lead them to do something as tragic as what we saw in Orlando.”

He said the point Obama was trying to make in his Tuesday speech outside of a National Security Council meeting “is that if we are engaging in policies or rhetoric that stigmatizes the entire Muslim-American community, that blames an entire faith for this terrible act of violence, that suggests in any way that we are at war with Islam we’re going to make that job much harder because, essentially, ISIL depends upon a narrative of a war between the United States and Islam to recruit.”…

“We believe that there is clearly a perversion of Islam from groups like ISIL. So, yes, they take Islam and they pervert it to their twisted ideology,” Rhodes replied. “They used it to justify the slaughter of innocents, including Muslims as well. And we have to combat both the organization of ISIL and that ideology.”

“We’ve had these debates about labels for some time, and we’ve been clear that we did not want to define ISIL, or al-Qaeda, or any other extremist group as speaking for Islam in any way. And we’ve avoid that terminology. The problem is, when you see that terminology taken to its logical end, if this is defined as a conflict that is inherently about religion that leads to policies like not allowing Muslims to enter the United States or policies of more excessive surveillance and denial of civil liberties to Muslim-Americans, as the president said today,” he continued.

“And that is what is so deserving is that ultimately, if we make decisions guided by fear, or by painting a very broad brush on our fellow Americans who happens to be Muslim, they will make the wrong decisions and do things that ultimately harmful to both our national fabric and to our national security.”…

Dear Lord, rational thought has left the building. Do these people not see that the national fabric is being harmed specifically because they won’t address the issue factually? Our leadership has welcomed the enemy into our camp, given them food, and provided shelter to stay overnight. We’re falling asleep, but once we are fully under, they will completely ravage us until none are left. We’re under attack externally and internally. Unbelievable to think this could happen in our nation. I never thought I’d see it…

This is so infuriating–that if we just pretend that ISIS ideology is something other than it so obviously is, we avoid alienating supposed “moderate” Muslims.

Here’s my question Ben. I’ll forget the that the self-appointed Caliph of ISIS has a Ph.D. in Islamic studies, that he is probably one of the leading Islamic scholars in the world, that ISIS followers imitate the behavior of Muhammed in every way, and that ISIS incessantly (and accurately) quotes Islamic scriptures to justify each and every act of barbarism they commit. But if ISIS is so clearly “twisting” or perverting Islam, can you,the President orJohn Kerry explain to us how (in as many or few words as you choose) ISIS Islam differs from Saudi Islam? Please explain this to me, I’m just so confused.

Obamas useful idiots are unwilling to fight Islam ideologically. Some Muslim Brotherhood supporter within Obama’s government has told Obama not to discuss the jihad doctrine.

They are afraid of non-Muslims learning about Islam and realizing that Islam can’t be reformed.

In fact, there is no mechanism for reforming Islam. Muslims can’t reform this Death Cult even if they want to. We have to encourage Muslims to abandon Islam because it is hopelessly backward, and Muslims are consequently unable to catch up with the progress of the rest of the world or socialize with us or even be our personal friends.

I fear you may be 100% correct. I wish Islam were capable of being reformed, but the more I see (and hear) the more it looks like an irredeemable death cult. And our leaders pretty clearly think that we,the Americanpeople, simply “can’t handle the truth.”

We must kill them & keep on killing, until their death cult is destroyed. We, trusting Americans, believed the BO military was doing that, but instead, they were trying to win the hearts & minds of the enemy, through bribing these soulless Devils. ENOUGH, we citizens are going to have to act, our GOV won’t.

Islam and its followers are a protected class in America and Great Britain.

If “Hindus” had committed 9/11 style atrocities in America and Great Britain, all “Hindus” would have been barred from entering America and Great Britain by now.

There would have been two lines at American and British airports: One for the “Hindus” and one for the non-“Hindus” for legitimate security reasons.

There was a time in America and Great Britain when if anyone was wrongly or rightfully accused of being so-called “Anti-Semitic”, her/his livelihood was over overnight and, as a result, s/he was permanently stigmatized.

Now, it is time for ongoing blacklisting by governments in America and Great Britain of any professional who can be cited as anti-Muslim racist, anti-Muslim bigot, anti-Muslim Islamophobe, etc., and, as a consequence, s/he would lose everything for the mere accusation alone, whether the accusation itself is false or not doesn’t matter.

America cannot really ‘declare a war’ on religion. It seems in this case a matter of terminology. For popular support a ‘war’ with a terrorist group would sell – a war of religion would be a political impossibility.

Islam isn’t simply a religion. It is also a political ideology, just as Communism is. In fact, Islam is far more political than spiritual. We successfully called Communism an enemy, certainly we can do the same with Islam!

If you have difficult time calling Islam the enemy then the weakness is within YOU, nowhere else!

I am fairly certain that Robert Spencer is not suggesting a declaration of war on all of Islam. (I’m certainly not). That said, it is intellectually dishonest and dangerous to ignore your enemy’s self-stated motivating ideology. ISIS is 100% Islamic, period. We face an existential threat from an ideology that is imbedded in Islam. Pretending this problem does not exist is not going to earn us some sort of ostrich victory. ISIS and its ilk must be defeated in every possible way–militarily, economically and ideologically. We are at war with a faction of Islam, or more accurately, a faction of Islam is at war with us. Sugar coating it with pretty semantics helps no one understand the danger we face, and takes the pressure off Muslim reformers (if any exist) to clean up their house. I’m sick of hearing “Islam is peace;” it isn’t and ever has been.

Ben Rhodes has not yet reached the age of 40. He is just one of many young idealogues in this administration who, like their leader, are unwavering in the certainty of their knowledge. They do not yet posess the years of life experience that forges wisdom from knowledge. They are much like their sanctimonious SJW brethren at the university. I so look forward to the day when a new administration made up of actual adults once again takes the reins of this country.

I am thoroughly disgusted with hyphenated Americans, and the use of “Muslim-American” in this and other articles. So, here is what Theodore Roosevelt had to say about it in 1915.

“There is no room in this country for hyphenated Americanism. When I refer to hyphenated Americans, I do not refer to naturalized Americans. Some of the very best Americans I have ever known were naturalized Americans, Americans born abroad. But a hyphenated American is not an American at all.

This is just as true of the man who puts “native” before the hyphen as of the man who puts German or Irish or English or French before the hyphen. Americanism is a matter of the spirit and of the soul. Our allegiance must be purely to the United States. We must unsparingly condemn any man who holds any other allegiance.

But if he is heartily and singly loyal to this Republic, then no matter where he was born, he is just as good an American as any one else.

The one absolutely certain way of bringing this nation to ruin, of preventing all possibility of its continuing to be a nation at all, would be to permit it to become a tangle of squabbling nationalities, an intricate knot of German-Americans, Irish-Americans, English-Americans, French-Americans, Scandinavian-Americans, or Italian-Americans, each preserving its separate nationality, each at heart feeling more sympathy with Europeans of that nationality than with the other citizens of the American Republic.

The men who do not become Americans and nothing else are hyphenated Americans; and there ought to be no room for them in this country. The man who calls himself an American citizen and who yet shows by his actions that he is primarily the citizen of a foreign land, plays a thoroughly mischievous part in the life of our body politic. He has no place here; and the sooner he returns to the land to which he feels his real heart-allegiance, the better it will be for every good American.”

Also note that Roosevelt referred to the “American Republic”, NOT “democracy”.

Islam is not a religion. It has no philosophical nor philanthropic merit. It is a political ideology. But we are just mincing words. It is time for action.

We are not fighting Islamic Extremism. Even that definition points to an underlying problem that can be taken to extreme limits. We are fighting the Islam of the Koran, the Islam of the Mosques.

The solution is to burn the Koran and to destroy the Mosques. Until we do that, we are just mincing words and Islam will continue to percolate for some later day. We are kicking the ball down the road. A game that we have played for 1400 years while we watch our women become slaves and we watch 270 million people getting killed, give or take ten million or so.

I agree with you – Islam is as much a religion as the KKK is. There may be some religious elements – like the KKK, but it in no way can be considered a religion. It is just an ideology justifying robbery, enslavement and murder by warlords.

We need a legal definition of “religion” in the US and Islam will lose all of the blanket legal protections it currently enjoys. Imams should be given the same level of respect as the KKK’s Grand Wizards are shown.

I would love to watch a “Roots” style mini-series on the Islamic slavery of Europeans, so I can finally explain to my children why we are genetically 99.6% European and .4% Middle Eastern/North African. My guess is that some ancestor of mine was enslaved, taken as a hostage and ransomed, or taken as part of a harem. Islamic history was brutal. My ancestor was probably lucky to have survived.

Deputy National Security Advisor Ben Rhodes told PBS that President Obama doesn’t use the term “radical Islam” because “we will be more effective in combating that ideology” of ISIS “if we don’t describe them as a religious organization.”

Because the Obama administration would rather double down than admitting they might be wrong.

Also remember that Muslims HAIL HITLER and think he was a great person. Islam ideology is the politic world of what Hitler was doing. And Hitler did not just killed Jews. Hitler also killed rich and poor, educated and uneducated . Hitler also killed his own supporters and change his military personals often . He claim that he could never trust those who would kill their own people.. Hitler went insane and was a drug users .

The Muslim wished that Hitler had killed all Jews and are sorry he was unable to do so but ISIS and Muslims promise they will finish what Hitler did not and Islam is kill all non- believers
And they will also continue to even kill their own People .

They are worshippers more to Satan then they are to any loving god. These are the People Jesus speak of in the BIBLE Muslim are the religion of the little gods of war and paganism

“And that is what is so deserving is that ultimately, if we make decisions guided by fear, or by painting a very broad brush on our fellow Americans who happens to be Muslim, they will make the wrong decisions and do things that ultimately harmful to both our national fabric and to our national security.”
It “happens to be Muslims” that are killing us!

What in the hell would it “harm” to put some fear into those bastards who kill us? What specifically is going to hurt the “fabric” of our nation more than these attacks? Prejudice and disdain? Too late to curb that! They love hating infidels its their life’s calling.

We better fucking fear for our lives! 49 more Americans are dead! We need to do everything it takes!

Dipshot also used “excessive surveillance” but that is exactly what is needed on Muslims. They should have to deal with that not us!

“Isis recruiting tool”?- BS they need no other tool than the murderous manifesto of Moe-Ham-Mad.

So now I can spread around that Islam can easily be “perverted” to justify killing. This administration can not win on protecting Islam it just can’t last.

Obama has his head so far up his ass that lump in his throat is his nose!

“Ben Rhode”s: “Will be more effective combating ideology” of Islamic State “if we don’t describe them as religious org”
Ben Rhodes has got that right. Right on the mark. MUHAMMAD’S BULLSHIT CAN NOT BE CLASSED AS A RELIGION. INSTEAD SHOULD BE CLASS AS A GANG OF THUGS.

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